Peng

So I've had some pretty good months of good growth...But recently after I switched from Seachem ReefBuilder & Advantage Calcium to Kalkwasser, SPS are getting pale, losing color, showing less PE, and shielded area start to STN. They also look like their skin is getting thinner and thinner with retreated polyps. The shielded areas (shielded by coral branches) started to STN, leaving branches still alive.

I have cyannobacteria and algae all the time. Recently algae on powerheads are dying off (not all...GHA still present). Cheato in the refugium is also dying off from the bottom slowly.  I've pulled off the Phosguard and carbon. It's a 90 gallon aquarium with 3 tangs and couple small fish. I feed them a lot but never used any coral food. Big alkalinity swing has occurred several times when I was adjusting the kalkwasser dosage. 

2 Evergrow LED lights, about 12 hours a day. I haven't changed water for about 2 weeks. I'm going to do a 1/3 water change later today. 

This kind of phenomenon I have seen for many times. Usually out of some reason corals grow very fast and then start to show "pale" very quickly and then STN/RTN... 

Some people say it's nutrients; some say it's lighting, while some say it's alk swing... I'm have no idea what is causing it & its repetition. Every time it comes I lose some corals... 

Please help... Thanks!

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I would like to hear some other people's experiences with BTT. Mine is a male and faded its color when I got it, and it's pretty thin, not exactly bony but thin. I bought shrimp, clam, squid and chopped them. I've been using this to feed him for a while but he doesn't seem to get better. Also he doesn't like selcon for some reason. I leave very early and come home late so he only gets fed once per day. I'm thinking if I should find a better home for him.

I just did the fallow tank treatment from Jan to early March. It was definitely hard but when fish returned ich is gone. Oh I also used cupramine and treated my tangs in a 60g.

I should pick it up as soon as possible. I have been using ReefBuilder and Advantage Calcium for a long while and with coral growth they are depleted very quickly. They are very expensive too.

I have been using it for about a year and so far it has been very good.

Chloroquine Phosphate also works pretty good.

A 10 gallon aquarium is very small. What kind of fish & disease are you treating it with? A 10 gallon aquarium is not a 10 gallon aquarium. You need to measure the size by your own and calculate the actual volume. Do it in metric and figure out how many mL cupramine you need to dilute it into the suggested concentration. I would say if you are treating it with angels, use 1/2 of the suggested dose for the first day, and do another in the following day, so that you have more time to make sure the fish can handle it. Also I recommend using the Copper Test Kit from Seachem since it's their brand and they have a reference 0.5 mg/L solution with it. Also change your water frequently when you do it in a 10 gallon aquarium. When you change water make sure the concentration is consistent with the water in that 10 gallon aquarium.  As you also mentioned, try to avoid adding dechlorinator in the water as it will make the water very toxic. I would recommend changing all of the water and redo it, or use carbon or CupraSorb. Inspect the copper level daily. Make sure to increase the concentration slowly. The part I hate copper treatment is that it can easily kill your fish, and you never know when is enough because some individuals couldn't handle 0.5 mg/L well.

Oh also make sure you test NO3 NO2 frequently... they can get up very fast.

Just got out of pchem and look at this be like 

Useful info though. I'll follow this thread.

AHAAA! This whole before and after, pre and post tense stuff workes wonders!

 

 

Anyways, How many tangs did you take out of the tank?

 

From the looks of another thread you removed at least a PBT and AT. I would hypothesize that the tangs were previously keeping this type of algae under control, and by removing the tangs you removed natural lawnmowers...aka tangs. Ever seen your tangs nipping at your powerheads, and seemingly algae-less rocks? Yeah, they are nipping algae before you even see it. All day long they are on the hunt.

Yes I think that's why... Can't wait until the fallow period is over...

If I posted a thread titled: Yellow tang vs Purple Tang

I may get a similar response, the tang police would be on full alert. Peng, I will hand it to you...you get lots of response on your threads.

 

I do have two zebrasoma in my 150 tank.

Zebrasoma flavescens(yellow) from Hawaii

and

Zebrasoma xanthurum(purple) Red Sea

 

These fish were both added on the same day. The yellow is larger than the purple. My tank was primed with lots of algae before the additions. I do see them daily flashing fins at one another, which does add stress of course, but it does not escalate, and the yellow is the boss.

 

One thing that is extremely important in attempting two tangs of the same genus is the individuals resistance to disease! While dominance is being established, FISH WILL get stressed.

 

This is really a major reason why Powder Blue's and Achilles are more incompatible than most! When the Achilles bullies the PBT, the PBT stresses....then what? ich is what. Next thing you know you could have yourself a full scale ich outbreak from either of these fish....which is exactly what happened it sounds like.

 

History repeats itself Peng, best to pick one or the other, and go with some other species of tangs...

 

100% of my favorite fish never make it into my tank! Meaning: even though I LOVE Cephalopholus Miniata (heck all groupers for that matter), it'll never live in my reef!

Definitely makes sense! I think I may just give one away,

If after a while they turn against each other again, I can sell PPT or AT after ich treatment. I really like my PPT. It's a very strong fish, and it eats all kinds of things. It has been with me for half a year...went from a skinny cow to a fat cat... But it's super aggressive.

Phosphates can leach from substrate, Rock, food, and even plastic water barrels can leach PO4.

 

Removing your fish is not a solution. You need a long term PLaN as to how you will remove excess nutrients. If your current plan isn't working time to try something else. There are a million threads on this topic, so do some research and I will stop my rambling.

Hi thanks for the concern but I didn't remove my fish to treat the algae break... The fish were out in the first place because aquarium rearrangement and ich elimination. 

Hi everyone sorry for the late response. I see all your replies. Thanks for everyone's suggestions The two have stopped being aggressive to each other recently. I'm dealing with ich now since the new AT introduced ich and I don't have a lot experience with QT so nutrients went up quickly after overfeeding. One month ago I used cupramine to treat PPT & Blue T & mandarin and they all got through it for 2 weeks

But now I have to do it again... 

why does that matter? It's still to small and you are introducing new fish to an already stressed situation.

Thanks for the suggestion but unfortunately I'm not able to upgrade the QT and I don't want to rehome any of them.

I relocated PBT once and once it got back it started to bully AT again. I need some suggestions to reduce the aggression.

Tank is to small, stop buying fish or rehome the PBT or both.

It's the QT.

My powder blue is killing the Achilles. I've had this fish for a while and everytime I introduce a fish that's close to size it goes crazy and horrifying. 2 weeks ago I bought an AT and PBT is going crazy even if it's smaller than AT. Since my PBT is very fat, it easily defeated and scratched AT... I tried to remove the PBT from QT (I'm doing a fallow DT treatment to ich) I really don't know what to do with this. The PBT is so beautiful but so scary... The QT is 60 gallons. I'll have to put the PBT into an isolation box. The wound on ATO shows infection..

I'm confused. Are you still feeding your tank with no fish? Also the results of phosphate tests will often site zero if the algae in the tank is consuming it faster than it is being produced.

I would not feed the fallow tank, manually remove add much of the algae as possible, and add some trochus snails and maybe some red legged hermits for algae control. Also reduce photo period.

Hi no I'm not feeding the tank. I think I have photo period for too long... 12 hrs.  So I'm going to reduce that. It has been fellow for like 5 weeks now... Not sure where does the nutrients come from. I added some snails. I bought a spottailed blenny but it cannot enter the tank yet...

I have had my all fish removed from DT for a month now, brown/green hairy algae started grow and cover the power heads and some areas of rocks, while the corallines are dying. This is very strange... I thought about starving them to death but doesn't it mean that corals will be starving too? Can anyone help me?

RO/DI TDS is zero.

Nitrate phosphate and nitrite aren't detectable.

No diatoms just hairy algae growing. Not sure if the nutrients came from the sand bed. My lights are on a lil bit over 12 hours per day.[attachment=38565:ImageUploadedByTapatalk1422151844.519981.jpg]

I think it's fine with 55 gallon. 180g can be around 2000 dollars if you go frugal.

As I removed fishes from my DT, I found that many SPS corals had the fastest growth I've ever seen... That's really strange. Maybe because I had too many fish before.

The good news is that both PBT and BT and mandarin are doing pretty good at about 0.45 mg/L Cupramine therapeutic level. The treatment is coming to an end. Fish looked definitely more stressed as Cupramine level increased but I'm happy that PBT got through this and is eating well.

I did not completely follow the instruction. Instead of raising it to 0.25 to the first day I slowed down the speed by 50%. All medicine was dripped slowly. I spent about 5 days to raise the copper level up to 0.50 and I used Seachem 's test kit. Then I decreased the copper level to 0.45 mg/L.

As for nitrifying bacteria, Cupramine did not kill all of them. Water quality is really good. I'm also using a skimmer.

I'm not sure about hyposalinity but Cupramine definitely worked.

I'll stop the treatment and see if any ich would still come out. So far so good.

I just saw a person using cupramine to treat his mandarin. And it died pretty quickly... I don't think I'll do that on mine. I read somewhere that copper is very detrimental to mandarin and its coat.

Skimmer, water movement, bacteria, fish population, feeding... I never really worry about NO3. If you don't have a lot of fish and you don't feed a lot maybe you can try add some BioSpira bacteria; they keep your NO3 really low.

You can get dead rocks, then buy a little live rock from LFS's DT, hobbyist's mature tanks... Anyway QT it before get it in. I hated when I introduced apstasia starfish and nems in, very hard to control.

If you want fancy ones, you can go for Radion. MH is my favorite though I won't choose them. Cheaper-but-not-bad ones you can find them on EBay. They can raise SPS, though might not be as good as more expensive ones. 2 for $200 is enough for a 75.